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Winnipeg Free Press

For Winnipeg mural artist, blank space is her happy place

Rachel Lancaster has a thing for blank walls — she can't drive past one without wanting to leave her mark on it. The mural artist is always on the search for the perfect canvas and, when she sees a wall she likes, she doesn't think twice before offering her painting services. 'That happens all the time. I've driven past a wall and wanted to paint it…. I will find the company and contact them. I always do it; why not? When you run your own small business you do whatever,' she says, laughing. Photos by Ruth Bonneville / Free Press Mural artist Rachel Lancaster creates huge artworks to fill empty spaces and has painted walls, garage doors and the exteriors of sea containers. There's one in particular she can't get out of her mind — an exterior wall belonging to Local Public Eatery, a downtown restaurant/bar on Garry Street. 'They have a beautiful white wall that faces a big parking lot. It's ideal for a mural — a mural is meant to be viewed from way back, because people then have enough room to look at it (properly),' she says. Lancaster been painting murals for almost 15 years now. It was a side gig when she first started. She would take on commissions in the evenings and on weekends, jumping in her car — always packed with brushes and paints — to create for as long as she could. 'I didn't have kids back then so I would paint all weekend. I never hung out, I just painted,' she says. Then the COVID-19 pandemic struck and Lancaster, an event co-ordinator, lost her job. She took on more painting gigs, assuming she'd return to her previous role when things settled down, but she never did. By then she was also pregnant, which spurred her decision to become a professional artist. 'Life had another plan and I just went with it and whatever happened, happened,' she says. Five years later and Lancaster now has a clothing line, she's designed colouring books and she has just written and illustrated her first children's book, posting her latest endeavours on her Instagram account, @rachel_lancaster_artist. Ruth Bonneville / Free Press Lancaster's tools of her trade — painting brushes and palettes. But murals remain her main focus. These days the artist is often booked two to three months in advance and has travelled throughout the province and beyond for painting commissions. The dream now is to go further afield. 'I've gone all over Manitoba, I've painted in Saskatchewan and in Ontario and up north in The Pas. I will travel worldwide to paint; I have a 10-year bucket list for my business and one of the things I want to paint is a really large wall in New York City,' she says. Lancaster paints on any kind of wall surface — stucco, brick, metal, wood, drywall, shipping container — and accepts both indoor and outdoor commissions. Her outdoor mural season usually runs from May to October while indoor mural painting extends from November to the following spring. She often rents a lift for taller buildings — she recently completed a mural on a six-storey apartment complex in Osborne Village — or uses an extension ladder for two-storey structures. Monthly What you need to know now about gardening in Winnipeg. An email with advice, ideas and tips to keep your outdoor and indoor plants growing. It's a physically demanding job, especially in the summer when she has to climb up and down ladders, sometimes up to 60 times per mural. She doesn't take on extra help either. The job suits her lifestyle and her personality. It feels, she says, like something she is meant to be doing. Ruth Bonneville / Free Press Lancaster finishes up a large mural on the side of a garage in a Winnipeg backyard. 'I love it. It's unlike anything else. When I was working in an office I would finish my work then stare at the clock. I would pace, I would go into different offices to chit-chat. I thought this was how life was, this was how work was meant to be. 'But this doesn't feel like work. The more I do it, the more I fall in love with it. I am in charge of my own schedule. I don't look at the clock, I don't take breaks, I don't stop for lunch. I just paint and then I go home when I'm done. It's blissful,' she says. AV KitchingReporter AV Kitching is an arts and life writer at the Free Press. She has been a journalist for more than two decades and has worked across three continents writing about people, travel, food, and fashion. Read more about AV. Every piece of reporting AV produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates. Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber. Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.